What's new
Fantasy Football - Footballguys Forums

Welcome to Our Forums. Once you've registered and logged in, you're primed to talk football, among other topics, with the sharpest and most experienced fantasy players on the internet.

Bari Weiss Quits! (1 Viewer)

Ministry of Pain

Footballguy
She quits!

I always felt she was worth reading and had a lot to say. Hard to keep this in the FFA but I will attempt to just keep it factual. I will be interested to see where she lands or if she launches her own platform.

I have seen some other scathing stories about Hollywood right now and the future of certain types of actors that are likely to be cast a lot less going forward, it's a New World. 

 
She quits!

I always felt she was worth reading and had a lot to say. Hard to keep this in the FFA but I will attempt to just keep it factual. I will be interested to see where she lands or if she launches her own platform.

I have seen some other scathing stories about Hollywood right now and the future of certain types of actors that are likely to be cast a lot less going forward, it's a New World. 
This likely won't do well in the FFA but I can't say I'm shocked.  This was the expected outcome of a world where people get their news from twitter or facebook.  Where the only "journalism" they see is Fox News or MSNBC or CNN.  

We no longer live in a culture where people are ok with others having an opinion other than their own.  A two second stroll through the Political Forum will show anyone that.  There was a time in our country when a difference of opinion and political discourse was encouraged... hell, even lauded.  That time no longer exists.  Tribalism and censorship are the mob's current feelings and I worry it's only going to get worse.

 
i only know her from Bill Maher's show & interviewing Jordan Peterson, but it would be soooo wonderful if the dramatic idiocy on both ends of the political spectrum forced all the reasonable people together to fight for America from the middle. let's get a party goin' on!

 
Last edited by a moderator:
If somebody asked me if I’d heard of this person I’d probably say 

“Barry Weiss?  Hmmm...wasn’t he one of those Brill Building guys that wrote songs for Lesly Gore and the Monkees and crap?”

 
i only know her from Bill Maher's show & interviewing Jordan Peterson, but it would be soooo wonderful if the dramatic idiocy on both ends of the political spectrum forced all the reasonable people together to fight for America from the middle. let's get a party goin' on!
I'm on board, it feels like when people such as Weiss are looked at as bad people, there's a problem whether it is generated on one side or the other. I feel strongly most people are pretty down the middle with smaller % at both ends in the extreme category.

 
Moved this to the Political Forum as I'm sure this is more where the discussion will be.

Interested to see so many people not know who she is. This was a hot topic among lots of people who follow the New York Times and media in general yesterday as it broke. And of course, it was way more popular among conservative leaning folks who are critical of what they perceive as the Times' bias. 

 
Last edited by a moderator:
This was her letter. https://www.bariweiss.com/resignation-letter

Dear A.G.,

It is with sadness that I write to tell you that I am resigning from The New York Times. 

I joined the paper with gratitude and optimism three years ago. I was hired with the goal of bringing in voices that would not otherwise appear in your pages: first-time writers, centrists, conservatives and others who would not naturally think of The Times as their home. The reason for this effort was clear: The paper’s failure to anticipate the outcome of the 2016 election meant that it didn’t have a firm grasp of the country it covers. Dean Baquet and others have admitted as much on various occasions. The priority in Opinion was to help redress that critical shortcoming.

I was honored to be part of that effort, led by James Bennet. I am proud of my work as a writer and as an editor. Among those I helped bring to our pages: the Venezuelan dissident Wuilly Arteaga; the Iranian chess champion Dorsa Derakhshani; and the Hong Kong Christian democrat Derek Lam. Also: Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Masih Alinejad, Zaina Arafat, Elna Baker, Rachael Denhollander, Matti Friedman, Nick Gillespie, Heather Heying, Randall Kennedy, Julius Krein, Monica Lewinsky, Glenn Loury, Jesse Singal, Ali Soufan, Chloe Valdary, Thomas Chatterton Williams, Wesley Yang, and many others.

But the lessons that ought to have followed the election—lessons about the importance of understanding other Americans, the necessity of resisting tribalism, and the centrality of the free exchange of ideas to a democratic society—have not been learned. Instead, a new consensus has emerged in the press, but perhaps especially at this paper: that truth isn’t a process of collective discovery, but an orthodoxy already known to an enlightened few whose job is to inform everyone else.

Twitter is not on the masthead of The New York Times. But Twitter has become its ultimate editor. As the ethics and mores of that platform have become those of the paper, the paper itself has increasingly become a kind of performance space. Stories are chosen and told in a way to satisfy the narrowest of audiences, rather than to allow a curious public to read about the world and then draw their own conclusions. I was always taught that journalists were charged with writing the first rough draft of history. Now, history itself is one more ephemeral thing molded to fit the needs of a predetermined narrative.

My own forays into Wrongthink have made me the subject of constant bullying by colleagues who disagree with my views. They have called me a Nazi and a racist; I have learned to brush off comments about how I’m “writing about the Jews again.” Several colleagues perceived to be friendly with me were badgered by coworkers. My work and my character are openly demeaned on company-wide Slack channels where masthead editors regularly weigh in. There, some coworkers insist I need to be rooted out if this company is to be a truly “inclusive” one, while others post ax emojis next to my name. Still other New York Times employees publicly smear me as a liar and a bigot on Twitter with no fear that harassing me will be met with appropriate action. They never are.

There are terms for all of this: unlawful discrimination, hostile work environment, and constructive discharge. I’m no legal expert. But I know that this is wrong. 

I do not understand how you have allowed this kind of behavior to go on inside your company in full view of the paper’s entire staff and the public. And I certainly can’t square how you and other Times leaders have stood by while simultaneously praising me in private for my courage. Showing up for work as a centrist at an American newspaper should not require bravery.

Part of me wishes I could say that my experience was unique. But the truth is that intellectual curiosity—let alone risk-taking—is now a liability at The Times. Why edit something challenging to our readers, or write something bold only to go through the numbing process of making it ideologically kosher, when we can assure ourselves of job security (and clicks) by publishing our 4000th op-ed arguing that Donald Trump is a unique danger to the country and the world? And so self-censorship has become the norm.

What rules that remain at The Times are applied with extreme selectivity. If a person’s ideology is in keeping with the new orthodoxy, they and their work remain unscrutinized. Everyone else lives in fear of the digital thunderdome. Online venom is excused so long as it is directed at the proper targets. 

Op-eds that would have easily been published just two years ago would now get an editor or a writer in serious trouble, if not fired. If a piece is perceived as likely to inspire backlash internally or on social media, the editor or writer avoids pitching it. If she feels strongly enough to suggest it, she is quickly steered to safer ground. And if, every now and then, she succeeds in getting a piece published that does not explicitly promote progressive causes, it happens only after every line is carefully massaged, negotiated and caveated.

It took the paper two days and two jobs to say that the Tom Cotton op-ed “fell short of our standards.” We attached an editor’s note on a travel story about Jaffa shortly after it was published because it “failed to touch on important aspects of Jaffa’s makeup and its history.” But there is still none appended to Cheryl Strayed’s fawning interview with the writer Alice Walker, a proud anti-Semite who believes in lizard Illuminati. 

The paper of record is, more and more, the record of those living in a distant galaxy, one whose concerns are profoundly removed from the lives of most people. This is a galaxy in which, to choose just a few recent examples, the Soviet space program is lauded for its “diversity”; the doxxing of teenagers in the name of justice is condoned; and the worst caste systems in human history includes the United States alongside Nazi Germany.

Even now, I am confident that most people at The Times do not hold these views. Yet they are cowed by those who do. Why? Perhaps because they believe the ultimate goal is righteous. Perhaps because they believe that they will be granted protection if they nod along as the coin of our realm—language—is degraded in service to an ever-shifting laundry list of right causes. Perhaps because there are millions of unemployed people in this country and they feel lucky to have a job in a contracting industry. 

Or perhaps it is because they know that, nowadays, standing up for principle at the paper does not win plaudits. It puts a target on your back. Too wise to post on Slack, they write to me privately about the “new McCarthyism” that has taken root at the paper of record.

All this bodes ill, especially for independent-minded young writers and editors paying close attention to what they’ll have to do to advance in their careers. Rule One: Speak your mind at your own peril. Rule Two: Never risk commissioning a story that goes against the narrative. Rule Three: Never believe an editor or publisher who urges you to go against the grain. Eventually, the publisher will cave to the mob, the editor will get fired or reassigned, and you’ll be hung out to dry.

For these young writers and editors, there is one consolation. As places like The Times and other once-great journalistic institutions betray their standards and lose sight of their principles, Americans still hunger for news that is accurate, opinions that are vital, and debate that is sincere. I hear from these people every day. “An independent press is not a liberal ideal or a progressive ideal or a democratic ideal. It’s an American ideal,” you said a few years ago. I couldn’t agree more. America is a great country that deserves a great newspaper. 

None of this means that some of the most talented journalists in the world don’t still labor for this newspaper. They do, which is what makes the illiberal environment especially heartbreaking. I will be, as ever, a dedicated reader of their work. But I can no longer do the work that you brought me here to do—the work that Adolph Ochs described in that famous 1896 statement: “to make of the columns of The New York Times a forum for the consideration of all questions of public importance, and to that end to invite intelligent discussion from all shades of opinion.”

Ochs’s idea is one of the best I’ve encountered. And I’ve always comforted myself with the notion that the best ideas win out. But ideas cannot win on their own. They need a voice. They need a hearing. Above all, they must be backed by people willing to live by them. 

Sincerely,

Bari

 
Powerful message.  Wish we had more like her.  How do institutions like the NY Time lose their way?  Lose what they were all about in just reporting the news and stories?  It is a little frightening the censorship that is slowly becoming normal.  Ideological subversion`s last stage is normalization and it happening right in front of us.

 
If somebody asked me if I’d heard of this person I’d probably say 

“Barry Weiss?  Hmmm...wasn’t he one of those Brill Building guys that wrote songs for Lesly Gore and the Monkees and crap?”
No, I think he was a shortstop for the A’s back in the 80’s...

 
Moved this to the Political Forum as I'm sure this is more where the discussion will be.

Interested to see so many people not know who she is. This was a hot topic among lots of people who follow the New York Times and media in general yesterday as it broke. And of course, it was way more popular among conservative leaning folks who are critical of what they perceive as the Times' bias. 
I was aware of Bari Weiss's existence, I knew about her position at the Times, and I had a vague awareness that she was controversial for some reason.  Aside from that, I have to admit that I know very little about her and I'm not sure that I've ever read anything she's written.  That's not meant as a knock.  It's just that I subscribe to WP so everything at NYT is paywalled for me.  I never read anything by any of their columnists unless it gets pasted here.

 
I was aware of Bari Weiss's existence, I knew about her position at the Times, and I had a vague awareness that she was controversial for some reason.  Aside from that, I have to admit that I know very little about her and I'm not sure that I've ever read anything she's written.  That's not meant as a knock.  It's just that I subscribe to WP so everything at NYT is paywalled for me.  I never read anything by any of their columnists unless it gets pasted here.
If someone as I'm assuming well read as you never reads anything by NYT's columnists, that's likely a big part of the picture too. And one more example of how the internet's changed the world. 

 
If someone as I'm assuming well read as you never reads anything by NYT's columnists, that's likely a big part of the picture too. And one more example of how the internet's changed the world. 
To be clear, I would read the NYT if it wasn't paywalled.  It's just that I'm only going to subscribe to one national newspaper and the Post won my business.  Please don't interpret this as me sneering at the Times or anything.

 
Wait. Bari Weiss. The guy with the deep voice that made music to get people in bed, right?

As much as New York ignores Minnesota, I ignore most things New York.

 
Many of my Conservative friends were all talking about it. They give me a little bit of a hard time for being a paid NYT subscriber. 

Interesting to see support for Weiss from people like Sam Harris.

Everyone is retweeting the @bariweiss resignation letter, and for good reason. It has been shocking to see the

@nytimes succumb to the hysteria, dogmatism, and cruelty of "woke" identity politics. This is how real journalism ends.
Also interesting to see some of my Conservative Christian friends aligning with Harris. Just one more example of something I learn more every day: People Are Complicated. 

 
Last edited by a moderator:
I know your'e being fun there but that's actually a big part of the picture. NYTimes is much more than New York. 
:shrug: Don't know what to tell you. I've never been interested in reading the papers from the coasts. Regardless of their perceived reputation or supposed importance. I guess that makes me ignorant. 

 
I guess I don't get it?  Other than the constant whining by conservatives that their voices are silenced what am I supposed to take away from the letter?
:unsure:  

I think what she's saying is what Sam Harris took from it:

Everyone is retweeting the @bariweiss resignation letter, and for good reason. It has been shocking to see the

@nytimes succumb to the hysteria, dogmatism, and cruelty of "woke" identity politics. This is how real journalism ends.
I don't know enough about the topic to have a strong opinion as to whether she's right or not. 

 
Last edited by a moderator:
Apropos of little pertaining to Weiss, but Ivan's brief interlude got me thinking: The WaPo is the better paper for national and front page news, I've found, especially in the political realm. Maybe spending the first part of adulthood in D.C. around politics makes me biased, but I think that the NY Times excels at other things other than its front page and national news items, which always struck me as predictably liberal even when they were trying to say that there was nobody in there hen house but the hens themselves. 

Just two cents. 

 
Apropos of little pertaining to Weiss, but Ivan's brief interlude got me thinking: The WaPo is the better paper for national and front page news, I've found, especially in the political realm. Maybe spending the first part of adulthood in D.C. around politics makes me biased, but I think that the NY Times excels at other things other than its front page and national news items, which always struck me as predictably liberal even when they were trying to say that there was nobody in there hen house but the hens themselves. 

Just two cents. 
Thanks @rockaction   I'm always interested in how different sources are perceived. 

 
I was aware of Bari Weiss's existence, I knew about her position at the Times, and I had a vague awareness that she was controversial for some reason.  Aside from that, I have to admit that I know very little about her and I'm not sure that I've ever read anything she's written.  That's not meant as a knock.  It's just that I subscribe to WP so everything at NYT is paywalled for me.  I never read anything by any of their columnists unless it gets pasted here.
I hate linking to Glenn Greenwald. I don't have the time to link several examples of Weiss's protests during her time at Columbia, but there is this from 2017: https://theintercept.com/2018/03/08/the-nyts-bari-weiss-falsely-denies-her-years-of-attacks-on-the-academic-freedom-of-arab-scholars-who-criticize-israel/

She was trying to cancel professors before cancelling professors was cool.

 
Moved this to the Political Forum as I'm sure this is more where the discussion will be.

Interested to see so many people not know who she is. This was a hot topic among lots of people who follow the New York Times and media in general yesterday as it broke. And of course, it was way more popular among conservative leaning folks who are critical of what they perceive as the Times' bias. 
Oh crap, I had gone my entire FBG existence avoiding this very place. I understand and respect why it was moved, I certainly was trying to keep it non political but yeah ok. 

I'm not going to read anything below this post, I get heartburn just thinking about this place and will not engage. I hear enough about it in other parts of the Tree around here. 

Cheers! 

 
Many of my Conservative friends were all talking about it. They give me a little bit of a hard time for being a paid NYT subscriber. 

Interesting to see support for Weiss from people like Sam Harris.

Also interesting to see some of my Conservative Christian friends aligning with Harris. Just one more example of something I learn more every day: People Are Complicated. 
Weiss did a piece on the "intellectual dark web" a couple years ago where she glorified Harris and some other extremely smart folks who are vocal critics of "cancel culture".  Not surprising to see Harris backing her as they both subscribe to the "OMG cancel culture!!!!!" narrative.  

 
Weiss did a piece on the "intellectual dark web" a couple years ago where she glorified Harris and some other extremely smart folks who are vocal critics of "cancel culture".  Not surprising to see Harris backing her as they both subscribe to the "OMG cancel culture!!!!!" narrative.  
Thanks @tommyGunZ. This was super interesting. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/08/opinion/intellectual-dark-web.html. It certainly was positive towards Harris. Not sure I'd call it glorifying. But super interesting. 

“Some say the I.D.W (Intellectual Dark Web). is dangerous,” Ms. Heying said. “But the only way you can construe a group of intellectuals talking to each other as dangerous is if you are scared of what they might discover.”

 
I consider myself to be pretty politically in tune but I had never heard this person’s name until I read some hysterical tweets about this being one of the biggest media stories in years. So I was quite perplexed.

 As someone said above, I don’t know nearly enough to have strong opinions.

 
Weiss did a piece on the "intellectual dark web" a couple years ago where she glorified Harris and some other extremely smart folks who are vocal critics of "cancel culture".  Not surprising to see Harris backing her as they both subscribe to the "OMG cancel culture!!!!!" narrative.  
So your implication here is there no Cancel Culture at all?  And it's not wreaking havoc on anyone?  It's not a big deal, right?  It's all made up and there is no evidence?

If i'm reading to much into your dismissive post, please let me know.  Thanks!

 
Last edited by a moderator:
Oh crap, I had gone my entire FBG existence avoiding this very place. I understand and respect why it was moved, I certainly was trying to keep it non political but yeah ok. 

I'm not going to read anything below this post, I get heartburn just thinking about this place and will not engage. I hear enough about it in other parts of the Tree around here. 

Cheers! 
Weiss choice  ;)

 
Thanks for the link. That is an interesting situation for CNN and MSNBC. It's easy to see why they wouldn't want to give Weiss attention. 

The downside for them though is not acknowledging it creates exactly this sort of opportunity for the sites that are supportive of her. And it starts to plant the "You can't trust 'Them" to tell you what's really happening". And that's pretty bad too. 

Tough spot. 

 
Last edited by a moderator:
Thanks for the link. That is an interesting situation for CNN and MSNBC. It's easy to see why they wouldn't want to give Weiss attention. 

The downside for them though is not acknowledging it creates exactly this sort of opportunity for the sites that are supportive of her. And it starts to plant the "You can't trust 'Them" to tell you what's really happening". And that's pretty bad too. 

Tough spot. 
She said in her letter, "Twitter is not on the masthead of The New York Times. But Twitter has become its ultimate editor"

Yeah...I trust Twitter to be unbiased in their determining of what qualifies as "All the News that's Fit to Print".

 
Last edited by a moderator:

Users who are viewing this thread

Top